Zhuge.com accelerates home search: Unveiling China's Startup Scene

Buying a home is a significant decision, but with so many properties to choose from, it can be a time-consuming and expensive process, especially in large Chinese cities. To address this issue, several online portals have emerged, such as 5i5j, Lianjia, Fang, and Anjuke, providing Chinese citizens with property listings and key information. Zhuge.com is a new player in this market, aiming to increase efficiency and reduce costs for real estate brokers and homebuyers by making information more accessible.

Su Weijie, chairman and founder of Zhuge, established the company in late 2015 in Beijing with the goal of providing comprehensive property information to help young families make informed decisions. Zhuge has gained support from investors like Fosun RZ Capital and Vision Plus Capital, raising RMB 100 million in its latest funding round.

Unlike established companies like 5i5j and Lianjia, Zhuge collects data from various online portals using its in-house search engine called Zhuge-HBSE System. This allows Zhuge to automatically aggregate and organize property listings from different brokers, offering users detailed and comprehensive information. For example, Zhuge.com listings include the property's listing history, price changes with different brokers, commission rates, and a historical archive of homes sold in the same neighborhood.

In addition to data gathered by the search engine, Zhuge's big data system includes information directly from real estate brokerages, including larger firms like 5i5j and smaller local firms. This comprehensive approach ensures that users have access to a wide range of data when making their decisions.

While Zhuge primarily generates revenue from brokerages' marketing activities on its online portals, it has also developed a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) product called Wolongyun. This product allows real estate brokerages to digitally record and organize each transaction, providing Zhuge with an additional revenue stream. By charging a small percentage of the sales or rent commissions from cooperating brokerages using Wolongyun, Zhuge has found success in the transaction side of the home buying process.

According to Su, Zhuge's SaaS business segment is growing rapidly and may surpass revenue from the online portal business by the end of the year. Despite being the largest real estate platform in China, Ke Holdings (Beike) only accounts for a small share of the total market, leaving plenty of room for growth for companies like Zhuge. Su hopes that Zhuge can become a company with a market capitalization of USD 10 billion in the future while increasing efficiency in the real estate brokerage sector.

In conclusion, Zhuge.com aims to streamline the home buying process in China by providing comprehensive property information and offering a SaaS product for transaction recording. With its data-driven approach and focus on increasing efficiency, Zhuge hopes to carve out a significant market share in the real estate brokerage industry.